


Taking Slow Steps

by miobambiino



Series: 'Hold On Back' Verse [2]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: But also, Canon-Typical Violence, Clint Barton's Farm, Developing Relationship, F/M, Hydra, Hydra's up to no good again, M/M, Major Character Injury, Mission Fic, Undercover Missions
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-02
Updated: 2017-07-02
Packaged: 2018-11-22 14:23:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,868
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11382015
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/miobambiino/pseuds/miobambiino
Summary: “Hydra is adamant this vault exists, they’re even betting all their resources on it, so thats enough to earn our attention. The idea’d been laughed at before, but I’ve go a funny feelin’ that its a bit too familiar to when the US was laughing at Schmidt for believing in Norse Gods,” the blonde said, earning the attention of the room.-In the wake of their rather shaky mission in Norway, the team regroup at Clint's farmhouse when they find intel pointing towards a vault containing the Super Solider serum. Naturally, Hydra are chasing rumours, and are going after it in Switzerland. The Avengers gather themselves together, juggling the mission and their personal lives, in going undercover in hope of sniffing out any more leads pointing towards the vault. Things are never as straightforward as first anticipated.





	Taking Slow Steps

**Author's Note:**

> After considering it for a while and it being requested here, I’ve decided to make a part II to my fic Hold On Back (Before Stepping Forward). This is going to explore Steve and Tony’s relationship more now that they’ve actually gotten together, and will look into Bucky and Nat’s developing dynamic - this fic will have a few chapters, so this is the first instalment!

Steve jerked back from Tony, casting a regretful look at the brunette’s way when the hands that were cradling his face were snatched away and set into fists, firmly place at his side.

“Daddy, you said we couldn’t sit n’the counter!”

Clint’s daughter, Lila, had a wry look on her face when she looked back at them. She knew exactly what she was doing.

“ _You_ ,” Tony pointed at her playfully, ignoring Lila’s tongue poking out at him between a gap-toothed smile. “I thought we were friends,” he hissed.

“ _You can’t!_ ” Clint’s voice piped up.

Steve gave her a steady look, hands out as if approaching a wild animal in submission - not a seven-year-old.

“How come they gets to do it and’er bein’ all gross ‘n _kissing_ as well?”

There was an uproar from the living room, and Steve squeezed balled his outstretched has into fists, wincing at the sound of footsteps clattering towards the doorway. Tony awkwardly slung his legs from where they hung over the edge of the counter.

Clint practically fell through the doorway, followed by Rhodey and Bucky, who had gleeful expressions plastered over their face.

“Get off my damn kitchen-worktop.”

 

* * *

 

Tony was brilliant.

Sure, Steve had been aware of that the moment he met the other man on the Helicarrier - despite their first introductions being relatively bitter.

It was only enhanced by the fact that he now gazed at the man through rose-tinted glasses. Well, that was a stretch, because glasses or not, Tony was astonishing.

“You one say that because he gets you off,”

“ _-C’mon man!_ ” Sam groaned, disgust evident in his tone, while Steve ran a hand over the back of his neck, which prickled with warmth. His cheeks probably weren’t any better.

They were hovered round Clint’s dining room table, freshly patched up after a few days rest on the farm. Laura was as welcoming as ever, not caring in the slightest when she interrupted a highly-confidential briefing, or a potentially fatal sparring session outside in her barn, pitchers of home-made lemonade in hand.

Sam just shook his head, and flicked around the schematics that floated in the air from the small device Tony had slipped into his pocket before the mission. It acted like a Cloud, storing essential data, as well as receiving updates from Maria Hill and Nick Fury themselves.

Nat strode in, looking devastatingly menacing even in just a baggy yellow shirt and pyjama bottoms - pink with cats on.

Bucky stared at her, unable to figure out just how she could still maintain an air of intimidation while dressed like… well, like _that_. She made his mind roll over, but each time it came up blank.

He knew her, better than anyone here. But that was all he knew. He was missing the vital pieces.  
Occasionally, she appeared in his dreams - just as flashes of red hair and gunfire. But she was in his nightmares too, pulling his head back, exploring his throat, the cold press of metal gently edging into his flesh.

She merely cocked an eyebrow at him. It was like she knew what he was thinking - was in his head, running circles around him. That woman was an anomaly to him, totally unpredictable, unreadable - perhaps the only person he’d ever met that made him feel exposed. Even when he wore a mask - literally and figuratively.

_What’s your game, Romanova?_

“Right,” Clint announced, clapping his hands together and rubbing them profusely as he strode in, Tony and Rhodey in tow, “What’d we get from Norway, then - other than a cold?”

Sam and Bucky waggled their eyebrows at the Captain, who resolutely ignored them, regarding his team with  a firm nod. None of them bought it, but pitied him, and let him carry on acting like He Was Totally Not Flustered.

“Hydra intel from this place is exceptional,” Steve spoke, causing the others to straighten up and regard the projections intently. “The system from the base acted as a kind of hub, gathering information from hundreds of other branches of Hydra.”

“Why was it not guarded more heavily?” Clint asked, voice flat like it was out on the field. Natasha huffed out a laugh at that.

“Were the alien cannons not good enough for you, Barton?”

“Well - theres that,” the archer mused, the corner of his lip turning upwards, “But I mean, if the base was so important, why didn’t they get more backup out there after the first strike? Why was it so… deserted, almost, the second time we - _you_ \- got in,” he amended himself, recalling the fact his ribs were too broken to actually go out into the field the second time.

The room hung in a contemplative silence, before Tony spoke up, leaving across the table intently.

“Because it wasn’t the most important thing Hydra has on their agenda,”

His calloused fingers spun through the projections, pinching and flicking through the data, seemingly randomly, before he scaled up a discrete file blandly labeled as ‘ _Filtration Systems_ ’.

“Why the hell are we looking at this?” Bucky snorted, furrowing his brow at the folder, which was password-protected.

“Was I the only one that noticed?” Tony asked casually, not taking his eyes of the projection, which he was currently trying to decode with lightning-fast finger strokes.

“Noticed what?” Nat asked, gaze flicking intently between the engineer and the schematics hovering between them all.

“Hydra’s filtration systems are funded by a company - a very shady, off-shore company -  called _Union Tech and Co_.” he stated matter of factly.

“Your point being…?”

“Theres a folder labeled _Union Tech and Co._ over there,” he pointed at the corner of one of the many floating screens, and just as he said, the folder glared back at them unimpressively, “So, we’re left with the question, why does an incredibly advanced computer system from an equally advanced illegal agency have duplicate files that aren’t even under the same tags?”

“Because one of them is a fake,” Natasha finished for him, quirking her head to the side and offering a small yet impressed smile.

As soon as she spoke, Tony had decoded the file, which exploded into hundreds of top secret documents, all of which had been produced in the last six months.

The room was cast in a brilliant blue, swimming in projections of blue-prints, transcripts, photographs of mission sites, of them, of Hydra’s top agents, of Pierce’s scheme, of the Winter Soldier. Steve and Bucky involuntarily stepped back slightly, as if avoiding being struck by a hologram - knowing full well it would merely phrase through them, made solely of light.

Rhodey unfolded his arms and reached for his phone in his pocket, not taking his gaze off the files, taking them in.

“I’ll call down Doctor Banner and the rest of the gang,”

“You can get hold of Thor?” Sam asked, voice distant as his attention was mostly drawn to reading the transcripts before him.

“I can sure as hell try,” the Colonel breathed with a huff of determination, stalking out onto the outside porch for better reception.

Nat had pulled down video footage of conferences shared between the heads of Hydra, Clint glossing over them which craning his neck over her shoulder.

Bucky flicked through the files on him, the other Winter Soldier projects, tossing relevant ones over the Steve, who was mostly engrossed in them, but kept flicking his gaze up to Tony.

The smaller man was sat cross-legged on the oak table, curiously tapping away at the blue-prints for weapons, buildings, armours, aircraft - anything remotely engineer-y. Tony’s intelligence was greatly underestimated; people had this conception that, because he didn’t act like a mild-mannered introvert, that he must not be a ‘Real Genius’.

How wrong they were. This man was brilliant, so fiercely intelligent he’d managed to pick out a needle in a haystack of intel - hell, it was a needle disguised as a stand of hay, if they were sticking with he metaphor. He didn’t think Tony would ever stop surprising him, and the thought of it made his stomach leap in a way that sent warmth etching into is bones. By some stroke of luck, Tony wanted him - the grunt who barked out orders and punched bad guys in the face.

“Banner is loading onto a jet - he’s got Maximoff and Vision with him, too,” Rhodey said, coming into the room and already flicking through the files Tony had put to the side to look at more closely later - the two MIT graduates took the data by a storm, both acting as pieces of a well-oiled machine. Steve couldn’t help but be wistful to have Rhodey’s mind, to have the intelligence to keep up with his best friend.

“Is he flying the jet?” Clint asked dubiously, a flutter of panic crossing his face.

“ _God_ , no, S.H.I.E.L.D’s dropping them off,”

“Oh, thank fuck… me n’ Laura only just finished patching up the barn the last time he landed the jet _into_ it.”

 

* * *

 

“What’s this I hear of yourself and Tony Stark?”

Thor was beaming at hims he strode across the living room, nodding a thanks to Laura and Clint as they welcomed the rest of their team inside their home.

Steve pulled the Asguardian into a hug, huffing out a sigh when they pulled back.

“Its… its barely anything, we just…”

“They were fucking on Clint’s kitchen counter,” Bucky said flatly, expression not betraying any form of lie.

At the same time Thor laughed outrageously and Clint scowled at the man, covering Lila and Cooper’s ears, Steve shoved is friend good-naturedly, breaking the other man’s stoic expression into a devious smirk.

“We were just kissing, for christ’s sake!”

“You kissed _Steve_?” Bruce spluttered at Tony, who was leaning against the doorframe to the kitchen, much louder than he had intended. Steve shot a look at the man, who had the good grace to look apologetic. He quickly coughed awkwardly, before trying again.

“I mean, cool, you kissed Steve-”

“Save it, Banner” Steve sighed, though it was with a touch of humour.

“As lovely as it is to see you all again - Wanda, I put some of those books you liked on the coffee table - I think I districtly remember you saying there was some urgent Hydra business involving secret Nazi programmes from World War Two,” Laura said, waving a hand around around too casually for the topic of conversation.

The team looked at her in varying stages of amused shock and admonishment.

“Not that Clint told me, or anything,” she shrugged lamely, taking her cue to guide Cooper and Lila out of the room, tossing a playful smirk at her husband, who just shook his head fondly.

“Oh, please - like you never told Pepper shit,” the archer threw at Tony, who looked mildly affronted.

“Why am I being singled out here? Thor tells Jane everything!”

“…I’m not from Earth, I can do as I like.”

 

* * *

 

“Hydra is pulling together its major Think Tanks from across the globe, pooling all their resources into digging up all the lost information of the serum used on Cap back in the good ol’ days of Polio. Doctor Abraham Erskine ensured he was the only man alive who knew the formula for a successful serum, but he wanted to ensure that he kept all of findings safe for when he needed to refer back to it.”

Tony motioned his wrist, sweeping up images of attempted remakes of the serum, and various documents Erskine had allowed the military to obtain.

“They recently began to make ground in Siberia, after the programme was dug-up again,” the brunette said, mind going a mile a minute.

“The site in Siberia was put on lockdown by the UN, theres no way Hydra can infiltrate it - no one has clearance to enter the premises,” Natasha prompted, arms folded as she leant over the wooden table they were all seated around.

“Yes, and I agree - no way in hell are Hydra managing to sneak past about one hundred armed soldiers defending every entrance to the place,” he then pulled up another file, “But, they were there long enough to find journals from the original team on the programme, many of whom firmly believed that Erskine collated all his data in some vault in Switzerland - the only place not teeming with special interest,”

“Why wouldn’t he have given the US Army access to the vault - if there is one - in the case of his death?” Bruce questioned, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose.

“Even I wouldn’t have trusted the US Army back then,” Steve quipped, strolling over to stand next to Tony, taking over the schematics.

“Hydra is adamant this vault exists, they’re even betting all their resources on it, so thats enough to earn our attention. The idea’d been laughed at before, but I’ve go a funny feelin’ that its a bit too familiar to when the US was laughing at Schmidt for believing in Norse Gods,” the blonde said, earning the attention of the room.

Thor shifted awkwardly in his seat, sniffing loudly.

“So, if they’re treating it as a top priority, so are we?” Rhodes questioned, nodding his head in approval when Steve gave an affirmative nod.

“Well, were off to Switzerland, I see,” Wanda smiled at him, just as Sam threw his head back and sighed something forlorn about not even getting over jet-lag from Norway, yet.

 

* * *

 

They’d decided to head off the following evening, getting one last day of rest before heading over to Switzerland, where they were sure they’d find Hydra sticking their noses into other people’s business.

Of course, not all of them would be going. Sam and Clint still had broken bones, and Rhodey needed more time between missions than the others at the moment; field work was out of the question. Instead, they would stay at the farm, sifting through the data and using their resources to see if they could find any leads on this rumoured vault Hydra had been infatuated in for over seventy years.

Steve wiped at the steamed-up mirror in the bathroom, hair wet and dripping not his shoulders from the shower he’d just taken. He stared at himself, droplets of water hugging his eyelashes, and face recovered from any scraped and bruising they got in Norway; but his eyes were heavy.

God, if he could wake up in a world where they’d finally, finally gotten rid of Hydra, he might be able to walk around with a lighter weight on his shoulders.

He pushed open the bathroom door, stopping short when he saw Tony waiting outside.

The smaller man’s hair was damp, appearing black in the dim lighting of the upstairs hallway, and he had shuffled into a large baggy sweatshirt and boxers, trying to appear nonchalant as he leant against the banister.

“Hey,”

“Hey, yourself,” Steve mumbled around a smile, glancing over the other man’s shoulder to see if they were alone. They were.

“Were you waiting for the bathroom, or?”

“No! Ah, no, actually, I was… I was actually waiting for you,”

“Oh?”

“Yeah, well,” the brunette shrugged aloofly, but the way his feet were fidgeting ever so slightly gave him away; he was nervous.

“Thing is, there are, like, three guest rooms in this place - not that I need to tell you, we’ve been here before and have been staying here, but…”

“But?” Steve smiled, leaning heavily against the doorframe, completely comfortable in his own skin, clad in just a bath-towel wrapped round his waist.

“But, there are four couches, and most if the guys have taken them, then your buddies - Wilson and Barnes, they’re in the spare room round the front of the house, then theres the girls, in the other one-”

“Tony?”

“Yah?” the brunette bit out tensely, trying to pass off nonchalance, but wincing at himself for saying _yah_.

“I’d be happy to share a room with you,” and the beautiful, crooked smile the smaller man gave him made all the rambling worth it, even if Steve found he didn’t and it much at all in the first place.

Of course, the others had left them with one of the two guest bedrooms with a double bed. Nat and Wanda had nabbed the room with two large singles - they’d spread out on them exaggeratedly much to the digression of Sam and Bucky, who grumbled as they squeezed into one small double bed together in the opposite room.

Steve grinned into Tony’s hair when the smaller man shuffled himself into Steve when they’d gotten into bed, making himself the little spoon. Contrary to popular belief, Tony Stark did like affection; he just had to be certain it would be mutual, save embarrassing himself.

And given that Steve had been kissing the life out of him in the kitchen a few hours ago, he was fairly certain it was mutual.

Steve wound his arm around the smaller man’s waist, pulling him in closely, enjoying the way Tony’s breath blew softly into his forearm - reassuring him of his presence.

Steve found that, for the first time since the accords, he fell asleep with a warmth embracing his body, and the weight on his shoulders didn’t feel so bad.

**Author's Note:**

> End of chapter one! Next one will be focused on Nat and Bucky, I promise!
> 
> Please feel free to follow my tumblr account, miobambiino, for updates, fic recs and requests, and other fandom-related stuff!


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